Howard-Miami County IN Archives Biographies.....Smith, Jacob L. 1839 -
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Joy Fisher sdgenweb@yahoo.com April 24, 2006, 2:22 am
Author: Jackson Morrow
JACOB L. SMITH.
The subject of this sketch holds worthy prestige among the enterprising
farmers and representative citizens of Howard county and it is with no small
degree of satisfaction that the biographer gives to the public the following
brief outline of his life and achievements. Jacob L. Smith is an Ohio man and
the youngest in a family of seven children, whose parents were John and Rebecca
Smith, natives of Maryland and Virginia, respectively. The maiden name of Mrs.
Smith was Rebecca Light. Her father moved to Ohio when well along in years and
settled in Montgomery county, where he spent the remainder of his life, dying at
the advanced age of eighty-four, his wife preceding him to the grave before the
family left Virginia.
John Smith, the subject's father, moved to Ohio after his marriage and
settled in the county of Montgomery, where he engaged in agricultural pursuits
and became a worthy and substantial citizen. After his death, which occurred in
the prime of manhood, his widow-rented a farm in order to keep her children
together and with the aid of her sons managed her affairs so as to live in
comfortable circumstances and give to each of her offspring a good practical
education. She survived her husband forty-five years and departed this life at
the age of eighty-four, honored and esteemed by all who knew her. Mrs. Smith
possessed many noble attributes of womanhood and all who enjoyed the privilege
of her influence were profuse in their praise of her amiable qualities of head
and heart. Her devotion to her children when deprived of a father's care and
guidance, she made paramount to every other consideration and so loyally and
unselfishly did she look after their interests that they grew up to honorable
manhood and womanhood, attributing to her unselfish efforts, all the success in
life which they achieved.
Jacob L. Smith was born April 23, 1839, in Montgomery county, Ohio, and
spent his early life in close touch with nature on a farm, and while still a
mere lad contributed his share towards the support of his widowed mother and the
rest of the family. At intervals during his minority he attended the schools of
his neighborhood and until his twenty-third year remained with his mother,
managing his farm in her behalf and otherwise looking after her comfort and
interests. During the Civil war he served in the Ohio Home Guard, but
experienced no active duty outside the state, though ready at any time to
respond to the call of the government in case his services were needed.
When twenty-three years of age Mr. Smith rented a farm in partnership with
his brother and engaged in the pursuit of agriculture upon his own
responsibility, the two continuing together until the end of the second year,
when the subject withdrew from the compact and came to Indiana, locating in
Miami county, where during the ensuing four years he tilled the soil on rented
land. By industry and excellent management he made his farming interest quite
remunerative, so much so in fact that at the expiration of the time indicated he
was able to purchase a farm of his own in Howard county, to which he at once
removed and which under his well directed labors was in due time greatly
improved, much of the land being cleared after he took possession and its value
increased by nearly one half over the purchase price. After residing on this
place for a period of twelve years and meeting with encouraging success, he
disposed of the land at a handsome figure and purchased the farm in Center
township, where he has since lived and prospered and where, as already
indicated, he stands in the front rank as an enterprising agriculturist and
representative citizen. When he purchased his present place, Mr. Smith found it
much run down and neglected, the fences being overgrown with briars and other
shrubbery and much decayed, all the buildings out of repair and the soil so
depleted by indifferent cultivation as to produce less by almost half than what
it should have yielded with even ordinary care and attention. On taking
possession he immediately inaugurated a series of improvements, which soon
resulted in bringing the soil back to its original fertility and enhancing its
productiveness to such a degree that in the matter of corn alone the yield is
now fifty bushels per acre more than formerly, the gain in other crops being
almost if not quite as great. This change has been brought about by ample
fertilizing, judicious rotation and a successful system of tile drainage,
together with correct methods of agriculture and the careful attention which
every- progressive farmer devotes to his labor and without which even the best
land and most approved implements of husbandry are unavailing. Mr. Smith is a
modern farmer in the best sense of the term, a close student of agricultural
science, and by adopting those methods by which the greatest and best results
are obtained he has achieved marked financial success and is now in independent
circumstances with a sufficiency of this world's goods on hand to enable him to
spend the remainder of his days in comfortable and honorable retirement. For
some years past he has been renting his land, about ninety acres being
susceptible to tillage, retaining the rest for pasturage. Like most enterprising
men of his community he devotes much attention to live stock of the finer
breeds, to which he feeds his share of the grain and from the sale of which he
receives no small part of his income. His buildings are substantial and in
excellent repair, having a commodious and comfortable dwelling amply equipped
with modern conveniences, a large and well arranged barn, good out buildings,
indeed, everything on the premises being systematic and in good taste and
bearing evidence of the intelligence and progressive spirit of the proprietor.
Mr. Smith was married in the year 1864 to Martha J. Turner, daughter of
Andrew and Rachel Turner, both parents natives of North Carolina, but early
settling in Miami county. Ohio, where they lived many years and where their
respective deaths occurred after passing the eightieth milestone on the journey
of life. They reared a family of seven children, six daughters and one son, the
latter a soldier in the late Civil war, serving in the Forty-fourth and
Seventy-first Regiments, Ohio Infantry, and taking part in a number of battles
and minor engagements in one of which, Beverly, Virginia, he was shot through
the body, the missile inflicting a dangerous wound, from the effects of which he
has never entirely recovered. Mrs. Smith was born in North Carolina and taken to
Ohio by her parents when small, and grew to maturity and married in her adopted
state. She bore her husband nine children and departed this life on the 5th of
April, 1908, at the age of sixty-six years, three of the children dying in infancy.
John V., the oldest of the subject's children, was born in 1864, and is now
a civil engineer, his home being at Green Bay, Wisconsin; Ida M., the second of
the family, born in 1867, is the wife of Hilas Morris, a farmer and carpenter of
Howard county, their union being blessed with one child; Glen R. was born in
1869 and resides in Tipton county, being superintendent of schools at Windfall;
Grace, whose birth occurred in Howard county in 1874, is the mother of one
offspring; Dr. Henry Smith, the fifth in succession, a well known and rising
physician of Indianapolis, was born in 1872; Dorothy, born in 1882, is the wife
of Edgar Utterback, to whom she has borne three children.
Although not an active politician, Mr. Smith is pronounced in his allegiance
to the Democratic party and has the courage of his convictions on the leading
questions and issues in which the public is interested. He has been identified
with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows for a number of years, having passed
all the chairs in the local lodge which holds his membership, and he endeavors
to exemplify the spirit of the noble fraternity in all of his relations with his
fellow men. Broad-minded and liberal, a thinker and close observer, he keeps
abreast of the times and in touch with current thought and discharges the duties
of citizenship in a manner becoming an enterprising and progressive American of
the age in which he lives. He stands high in the esteem of those with whom he
mingles, has many warm friends and has ever tried to do the right as he sees and
understands the right. Quiet and unostentatious and seeking the sequestered ways
of life rather than its tumult and strife he has ever attended strictly to his
own affairs and made better all who come within the range of his influence.
Additional Comments:
From:
HISTORY OF HOWARD COUNTY INDIANA
BY
JACKSON MORROW, B. A.
ILLUSTRATED
VOL. II
B. F. BOWEN & COMPANY
INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA
(circa 1909)
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